I would prefer to resolve disagreements with mutually respectful dialogue. But when that fails, I’ll take fear.

On Thursday, the Colbert Report did a skit where the punchline was “I am willing to show the Asian community I care by introducing the Ching-chong Ding-Dong Foundation for Sensitivity to Orientals or Whatever.” The editor of the show’s Twitter account then tweeted the joke. In response, Suey Park, a writer and activist instigated the hashtag #CancelColbert. That same evening, the tag trended, and received wider media attention, with Park appearing on HuffingtonPost Live. Park’s follow up tweets attracted positive and negative attention, including the all too predictable misogynistic psychos. Some prominent Asian American bloggers and celebrities thought that Park was going too far.

I think her callout of Colbert was completely appropriate.

I despise the entire “ching chong” routine. When I was a teenager, my family moved to a town that had very few Asian residents. Sometimes I was the only Asian kid in the room at school and I had to hear that shit constantly. Most of the time there wasn’t much I could do, other than take it because I was outnumbered. Too many people I know have similar stories. There is a persistent perception in American society that Asian people are submissive, safe targets for their aggression, and the repercussions of this belief extend into adulthood as well. In my professional life I often have interactions with white attorneys who seem to think that I am going to simply back down to their childish attempts at talking over me. I am more than willing to verbally assault another attorney until their voice wavers. A couple of years ago I had an attorney chase me out of a courtroom and assault me in the corridor, which ended in a way that was severely embarrassing– for him. And I’m not sorry.

Other people I know report similar situations, with coworkers who seem to be under the impression that they are just going to lie down and accept whatever treatment they dole out, meekly. When describing an especially contentious meeting, someone I know said “I never thought I would use so many f-bombs in a professional setting.”

I can’t even say that I see the worst of it either, as my female friends report that they face everything I do, with a side helping of sexual harassment.

Asian Americans are not viewed as people by American society. Some might call me paranoid, and claim that I (and my friends) are overly sensitive. Well those people can go stab themselves in the eye, because, like a good Chinese son, I have numbers. First, let’s look at school bullying, where over 50% of Asian students report being bullied. We can also look at another indicator, dating preferences. There are two interesting sets of data on the topic– the 2009 OkCupid post, and more recently, the “Are You Interested” data from 2013. Both data sets confirmed what has long been conventional wisdom in our community– that America views Asian females as desirable, and Asian men as invisible. This is again, because American culture codes “Asian” as submissive, considered a desirable trait in women and an undesirable one in men. While some Asian men (including a younger version of myself, for whom I apologize) view this as an “advantage” for Asian women, it isn’t really. Instead it is another way in which American society dehumanizes Asians, refusing to grant us the same humanity that it grants white people.

After looking at the data, it seems like we have not made much progress in getting the media to stop dehumanizing Asian Americans. I understand that commentators like Jeff Yang may think that Park went too far in eliciting a ferocious response to Colbert. I am sensitive to Yang’s argument that online activism is not a replacement for other forms of organizing. In fact, I could actually take that one step further, and say that organizing around problematic media is inadequate to transform the profoundly unjust political economy that pervades our lives. I’ve felt that way for a long time, and it is the reason that most of my organizing and writing has been around issues of political economy. Arguing over identity and privilege often feels to me like a fool’s errand when humanity is staring down ecological collapse and an ever widening gap between rich and poor. I’ve grown cynical too, about an Asian American politics that simply asks for a chance to lean in on the neo-liberal deal. From my reading of Park’s tweets, it seems she is not enthusiastic about that either. I suspect, though, that our politics are different. Park has tweeted about dismantling the state, while my focus is on harnessing the tools of the state to serve socialist goals.

I could take it a step further and argue that discussions about media representation are a waste of time. But I won’t. Because very clearly, media representations set the baselines of conversation for millions of Americans. And that conversation is hurting women and people of color generally, and Asian Americans specifically. Given that, I see the value of continuing to challenge those representations.

I have no doubt that after viewing the Colbert Report, some jerkoff 12 year olds went to school and repeated the skit to the only Asian kid in their class, and if the kid complained, they asked her “why can’t you take a joke?” Stephen Colbert and his writers, on the other hand, are well-to-do media personalities and they can take the heat. Park isn’t going to get his show cancelled. But if this makes annoyingly stupid comedy writers back off of their stupid because they are afraid of being the victim of an Asian American Twitterstorm, then I’m fine with it.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Timothy Y. Fong is an attorney and occasional political organizer. Sometimes he commits acts of journalism. Follow him on twitter @tyfong919.

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LSFHSK

Thank you for taking the time to write this. Just one thing–pretty sure he spells it “Stephen” rather than “Steven”.

“I have no doubt that after viewing the Colbert Report, some jerkoff 12 year olds went to school and repeated the skit to the only Asian kid in their class, and if the kid complained, they asked her “why can’t you take a joke?””

yep…pretty much

hahnchen

If your argument against Colbert is that “some jerkoff 12 year olds went to school and repeated the skit”, then that’s an argument against satire as a form. And that’s why the CancelColbert campaign deserved derision. Colbert used racist language to highlight the regressive nature of racism, he showed how attacks against the native American community were an attack against all minorities.

There will be a visible jerkoff subset who take his words at face value. There will be those who don’t get the point. But satire is at its best when it’s speaking up to the audience, the audience has to join the dots – and by in large, they did.

hahnchen

If your argument against Colbert is that “some jerkoff 12 year olds went to school and repeated the skit” then that is an argument against satire as a form, and that is why the CancelColbert campaign was deserving of derision. Colbert used racist language to highlight the regressive nature of racism, he used an anti-Asian slur to show how the Redskins naming issue wasn’t just a Native issue, but part of a broader issue about race.

Sure there will be some jerkoffs who don’t get it, who take the words at face value. But satire is at its best when it speaks up to the audience, asking them to join the dots, and by in large – they did.

tyfong

Thanks. This is what happens when writing late at night!

tyfong

It isn’t a condemnation of satire generally, but of this instance specifically. There’s a time/place issue with most forms of expression. People have to use their judgment about when particular forms are appropriate. For example, shouting is a great tool– but do we want to do that all the time? No.

hahnchen

We don’t want satire all the time, and we don’t have it all the time, we have it on Colbert’s show.

While the original tweet, without the context, was the wrong place. His show is clearly the right place. What was disappointing was that following the deletion of the tweet and providing of the context, the CancelColbert demands only grew louder.

Yet given that context, their argument became much weaker. Instead of acknowledging this, they just started to shout much louder. And when you look at the principals involved, shouting is pretty much all they do, all the time.

Hitch

It was satire guys. Colbert is on your side against racism.

Herostratus356

Being afraid to say certain things in front of certain people is just a part of life. I don’t know why white people think they are being uniquely persecuted by calls for “political correctness.”

Herostratus356

Chris Rock’s “Black People vs. Niggers” routine was intended as satire but even he had to disown it when white people thought it gave them license to use racial slurs.

NoFactsZone

Thank you for sharing your story, Timothy! As is usual of white,
anti-Asian racism, the racist motivation of veiled verbal assaults
against Asians within a racialized environment is downplayed for any
other intersecting factor besides race, and especially by the so-called
“left-leaning”, “progressive”, or “enlightened” advocacy types. Of
course, context is always important in evaluating comedy, but what about
the context of those most “implicitly” affected by such racist humor,
namely our (Asian American) children? I believe that organizing around
what WE CAN do, instead of what a racist system SHOULD do, is at the
heart of a movement to inspire.

ducksauce001

We Asians need to take some blames for some of the mentality too.

1) I’ve seen way too many Asian women who look down on other Asians when they’re walking around with their white boyfriends/husbands. (Seriously?)

2) We don’t stick together. Oh you’re Japanese? Sorry, won’t help you because of World War II (WTF!?)

3) Our parents are too focused on education. While school is important, I rather have kids learn Tae Kwon Doe/Karate for self defense against racist bullies than going to Chinese school/tutoring/piano school on the weekends.

4) Kids: they are not proud of being Asian. I’ve seen enough Asian American kids who refused to even speak Chinese/Korean, etc to their parents even though the kids understand it. They make fun of/degrade FOBS in school rather than looking out for them.

I wasn’t offended at first and I thought little of the whole thing until I came across aritcles saying to “calm down” and many comments saying things like “asians can’t play the race card.” and “Asians can’t take a joke or drive.” I’m starting to feel differently about the whole thing. Here’s my take:

I only get offended by these types of shows when they don’t make fun of all races equally. Like when they’ll freely use the j or c word but will never say the n word. But I’ve been a fan of this guy for a long time and seen him use similarly offensive jokes to highlight bigotry against other groups.

But people have the right to be offended at what they want and I understand where the author’s coming from. If they apologized for their comments (not sure if they did, I see from other comments that they deleted the tweet at least) then that should be it, in my opinion.

As for the racist jerkoffs that’ll repeat this and tell you that you shouldn’t be offended by jokes…these people were racists before Colbert. They were gonna say and do racist things no matter what. Learning how to deal with that is more important.

iko: STFU mikey STORMloq, the same garbage that is found in STOMRfront. Aren't you yourself doing the same "...making subjective statements about your own ethnicity, just... – What Do White Supremacists Think of Asians?